A Facebook Discussion

"If our house be on fire, without inquiring whether it was fired from
within or without, we must try to extinguish it." ~ Thomas Jefferson

My Liberal Doctor nephew and I have been having an interesting discussion on Facebook lately. I thought I'd share it with my two readers, and invite comment:

It started when my nephew placed the following as his Facebook status:

"'They’re paying all these boats to run around like headless chickens,' [U.S. Rep. Gene] Taylor said, as reporters gathered to hear his assessment of the Sound....'I’m having a Katrina flashback. I haven’t seen this much stupidity, wasted effort, money and wasted resources, since then.'”

And then, he added this link.

I replied, "Here's one reason nobody's doing anything:", and then, I added the link to the following video:



To which he replied, "Allow me to retort:" and then added two links, both of which made the same basic point: Here, and here.

I, in turn, copied and pasted a portion of his first link, thusly:

"A chart provided by the State Department shows that as of June 23 five offers had been accepted and 50 were under consideration"

And, made the following comment:

"50 are under consideration? What are we waiting for? I'll tell you what we're waiting for: Obama and Emanuel are still considering how they are going to use this crisis to their own advantage."

I then added a link to this article, which I had linked to in my last blogpost.

To which he reiterated the point he made with the last two links by posting yet another link which said basically the same thing as the two previous links.

Then, I wrote back:

"Why would paying for foreign help be a problem for the biggest tax and spend President in our history? He is willing to send billions of tax payers money to big wall street corporations to stave off bankruptcy, only to see them waste the money on lavish parties and huge bonuses for their executives, yet he hesitates to pay a few million to help clean up the gulf?

Which is more important to the United States? Padding the pockets of Wall Street lobbyists and their employers, or saving the environment? It seems Obama has already provided the answer to that question.

And while we're on the subject, why is he wasting time pointing fingers instead of looking for ways to stop the leak?"

To which he replied (with an apparent growing frustration at my flawless logic):

"Wait, you're mad because the president was doing something besides looking for ways to stop the oil leak? This is the president and administration that enrages you when they get involved in crises in the healthcare industry, the auto industry, Wall Street, consumer protection, etc., but now their so-called lack of involvement in plugging an oil leak is your gripe of the week? Your politics are, um, complex. Definitely over my head, at any rate."

The last word (so far) was delivered by me, as I respectfully replied:

"I'm not mad. I'd say perplexed is a more appropriate word. And, I would never even imply that anything I say is over your head. I have too much respect for your intellect than that. After all, you ARE in my family. :-) Nevertheless, let me make it simple for you:

I am opposed to the government intervening in the free market system. Despite what Obama says, no company is "too big to fail". Nor would a company's failure mean the end of business in America. If they are so irresponsible that they can't stay afloat using sound business practices supposedly learned in their MBA programs, they deserve to fail. When one business fails, another springs up to take it's place. That's how the free market is intended to work. Ginormous corporations clinging to the brink of failure is not a crisis. Neither is healthcare or the environment.

Obama knows this. Otherwise, his response to these so-called crisis would not take effect sometime in the next ten years or so. He would initiate them immediately.

However, tons of highly toxic crude oil spilling out into the gulf of Mexico is an immediate crisis which calls for immediate measures.

A true leader would look to stop the bleeding and worry about who's at fault and who's ass to kick once the initial problem is solved. There is plenty of time to punish the guilty after the leak is stopped. (and, at this point, I resorted to one of Dan T's tactics) Surely you agree with that?"

Update: He did at least agree with me that punishing the guilty can wait until the problem is solved. See? Some Liberals have some common sense!

I'm proud to be his uncle!